Death's Merchant: Common Among Gods - Book One

by Justan Henner

  Where her hand touched, the mask began to smoke. He could feel the heat emanating from her hand, but he did not flinch. Lu had died before. He was not afraid to do so again. Mostly.

  “It was the book,” Fate continued, “wasn’t it? You… you spoke true. Jem did not leave Vale because you pushed him, at least not directly, but you were there when he left. Did you maneuver it that way? Did you?”

  Lu smiled. “It was a coincidence,” he said. And it had been coincidence. At least he was pretty sure. There were a lot of things he did without really knowing he was doing them. But of course, that was what made doing them fun, so that he could find out later all the fun things that he’d been doing while he didn’t really know that he was doing them. Like magnets. He liked magnets, especially the magnets he’d hidden in the chapel. And in Ivan’s shoes. He didn’t know why or when or how he had done that either, he just knew that he’d come to appreciate his steward’s slouching walk.

  “I don’t think it was,” Fate’s smile was coy. She dropped her hand, the smoke drifting away, swirling with the passage of her fingertips. “It was the book, wasn’t it? You distracted me, so that I would not realize the importance of the book. I can play games, too.” Her hand drifted toward his crotch, which frightened him, until he realized that she was reaching for Teachings of a Whore, and then he was just a little disappointed.

  He pulled the book away, though he didn’t really care if she touched it. It would do nothing for her. “The book is unimportant.”

  “Then let me have it.”

  “I…” Lu frowned. “No.”

  “Why not? You say it’s not important.”

  “Because it is mine.”

  “It’s not yours at all. You are not Dydal, remember?”

  “I am not Not-” Lu paused as he realized there was no reason to correct her, then, realizing that the lack of a reason to correct her, was in fact a reason to correct her, decided not to correct her. “-Not Lu,” he corrected.

  “You are not, not, not Lu?”

  He counted the ‘nots’ on his finger. “Yes?” he asked. He was pretty sure that was right, except that she had not put enough emphasis on the final ‘not.’ Further proof that she was pure evil.

  “Give me the book.”

  “No.”

  “Then tell me why you wanted it.”

  “No.”

  “Then tell me what you really want.”

  “No.”

  “You are a liability, Dydal.”

  Before he could correct her, she slipped a hand under his mask and put a hand over his mouth.

  “Don’t speak. You’ve burned Dekahn, you’ve ravaged a moon, you’ve pushed the celestials themselves into chaos. I’d call it a new low for you, but that would only encourage you to do far worse. And that is so unlike you… You’re usually so rational… You’re usually too… arrogant to do anything so brash. You are not yourself. Your behavior has become so erratic that I’m almost starting to believe that you really aren’t Dydal…” She leaned close to him, her voice low and sensual. “What are you trying to hide?”

  Her passion was false, her attempt almost sad. She did not remove her hand from his lips.

  Lu twitched, sputtering against the fingers which closed his mouth. He grabbed the hand on her cane and held it like she was an old lover. “You wouldn’t like the answer,” he whispered past her fingers.

  “And why is that?”

  “Because you couldn’t take it.”

  “No?” she asked.

  “No,” Lu said. “You couldn’t.”

  “Then tell me something that I can. What’s in the book?”

  “Pages.”

  “How did you get Rift to agree to help you?”

  “Extortion.”

  “Why did you interfere with Jem?”

  “I didn’t.”

  “Didn’t then, or aren’t now?”

  Lu smiled.

  She dropped her hand from his mouth and stepped away from him. “What are you doing? What have I missed?”

  “Nothing at all,” Lu said.

  Sudden anger twisted her false, sweet smile into a scowl as she pulled away from him. “Don’t mock me,” she said. “Do not mock me!”

  “Mock you? Was I mocking you?” Lu thought back to the events of the last few months. Was doing her job better than she could herself a form of mockery? “Yes,” he said aloud, nodding emphatically. “Yes, I was.”

  “What are you after?” Fate demanded.

  “After?”

  “You told me that you had not interfered, that it was Just who had interfered with Jem Trask, but Just knew nothing. He didn’t know that I had made a deal with his mother. He didn’t know that Jem was integral to that bargain. The fool didn’t even know of the boy’s existence. Why are you working against me?”

  Lu ignored her question as he watched her seethe. It should perhaps, have brought him satisfaction, that he had been able to make her as angry as he had, yet it didn’t. “Why have you returned?” he asked. “If I have betrayed you, why are you here?”

  Fate opened her mouth, yet she did not speak. She paused, frowning, and then she took a heavy breath. Her face calmed, but the calm seemed forced. “I…” The word was angry. Fate paused and tried again, her words quieter, yet not much nicer. “I have come to offer you a deal.”

  Lu frowned. “And you think I am foolish enough to accept one of your deals? I have already told you no.”

  “It is not my usual sort,” she said. “This cannot continue. You and I are aligned in purpose. We both seek the return of Death, yet our petty strife undermines us both. It cannot continue.”

  Lu smiled. “Are we aligned in purpose?”

  Her ‘composure’ slipped. “Stop it!” she hissed. “Stop this now. I gave you the world, Dydal. I gave you a place in our society, in our utopia, and you threw it all away for a woman. You threw it all away for a godsdamned whore! This world is mine, it was entrusted to me. You shall stop this now!”

  For once, Lu let the designation rest, though he was not Not Lu. “Is that your offer?” Lu asked. He needed to hear the words from her lips.

  Fate growled. “What I offer is a simple truce! No face given, no face lost. Neither of us will bend, that is clear. Neither of us will forego our desires. So, let us not pretend. Instead, we promise just to stay away.”

  “And if I accept this truce, will you call off your pawns? Will you tell the Magistrate to accept his lot in life, to resign himself to be my lesser? Will you release Tabetha from your service? Tell her to go home to her mother and kill no more? Will you tell her not to kill me?”

  “You know of all that, do you?”

  “I know everything, Clarissa.”

  “Do you? If you knew it all you would not oppose me! You know that what I seek is my right! That it is needed! Even your whore agrees with me. Death must be restored and the Call ended. I have been given a sacred duty. You were invited here to assist in that duty, and instead you have foiled everything! All of this, everything this world has become, it is your fault. You are the ruin of Trel. You’re the reason for everything that’s gone wrong. All because you thought you knew better, but you do not! You do not! It is not even your place to pretend!”

  “This world is as much mine as it is yours,” Lu said.

  She glared at him, a look he could not read stretched across a placid face. “No, Dydal. It is not.” She shook her head then released a slow, agitated sigh. “It really, truly isn’t. Just let it be. Let me get back to doing what I have been entrusted with.”

  “I am not Not Lu,” Lu said.

  The Fatereader glanced at him and laughed. “Of course,” she balked. “Of course you’re not. Fine, if that is the way it must be, then there will be no truce.”

  As she turned to walk away, Lu pondered how much he should tell her. She was not the villain in this. In many things, she was the villain, but in this, she was simply misguided. She was simply wrong. There was no evil in that.

&nb
sp; “I cannot give you what you want,” Lu said.

  Fate stopped and turned. “Why?”

  “Because what you want cannot be.”

  “You will stop Death’s return?”

  “No. I do not like it, but Death is needed. The aspect must return.”

  “Then what do you want, Dydal? What do you want?”

  He didn’t bother to correct her. “I want you to stop your attempts. I want you to release the Mother from her bargain. I want you to leave Trel and not return. Walk away and let me do what needs to be done.”

  “You dare? This is my home. Not yours. This is my task, not yours.”

  “You have failed, Clarissa. You don’t understand what you seek to create. You didn’t the first time. You still don’t now. You ruined Death. You made of her a monster. A villain, to kill on your command. You destroyed the aspect. Walk away, and let me make things right.”

  Fate scoffed. “You arrogant prick… You think you understand this world better than I? That you understood her better than me? That you understand the birthright, better than me? I am its manifestation upon this earth. I am its will empowered, and you speak to me as though you know better?”

  “A god of negation must come from nothing,” Lu said.

  “You make up pretty words, Dydal, but that doesn’t give them value. Don’t parrot your nonsense to me like it has some meaning.”

  Lu shrugged. “Clarissa, no matter how hard you try, you cannot bring her back.”

  “What?”

  “You and I are at odds, because you resist your role. We are at odds because you have thrown yourself into an impossible task. You can dress that girl up. You can teach her the same habits. You can give her the same name. But it changes nothing. That girl Putrescence is not your sister. She will never be the Death that you have lost. She will never be the woman that Just slew. Stop fighting against your aspect, accept that she is gone, and let me do what must be done.”

  The scryer’s mouth twitched. Her hand shot from her side and grabbed his throat. She pulled him close, her hand a vise against his flesh.

  “You know nothing,” she said. “You never have. You are but a foreigner here. Meddling in things you do not understand. I could break your neck, and no god would care. Fate and that imaginary Absence would look away, they would let me cleanse you from this world, as you so desperately deserve.”

  Lu lifted Teachings of a Whore and dangled it before her face, smiling as he did so, wishing the mask did not obscure it from her gaze. “Yes,” he agreed. “Yes, I think you’re right. Absence wouldn’t care. Nor would Fate. But this is my world, now. This is my future, and my destiny. You really want to know why I make no bargain? Because I see your fear, Clarissa. You come to me because you are afraid. You know as well as I, that should Just return to Atherahn, that he will kill you. This time he will not hesitate. He will not flinch. He will end your life and this world will not shed a tear.”

  Her fingers dug into his neck. Her grip was crushing his windpipe, but that had never stopped him from speaking before.

  “It is over, Clarissa. You don’t yet see it, but I have already won. It is only a matter of time.”

  “What have you done, Dydal?”

  “I am not Dydal. My name is Lu.”

  “I will break your neck!”

  “Do it,” he whispered. The game was over. “Try, Clarissa. See what comes of it, you tired old hag. You’ve never seen it, have you? You just refuse to give up. Your time is over. The pantheon of Fate and Death is long deceased, and not even Death’s return will revive it. I am its master now.”

  Fate’s grip tightened, constricting his breathing to barely a trickle. For a moment, he thought, maybe this was it. Maybe this time he would die? And then he kicked the old bitch’s cane. She tumbled forward onto the cobbles.

  With a boot on her back, Lu leaned forward and smiled. “Your time is over, but you’re not yet spent. Go back to Atherahn. Lick your wounds. Prepare for Just’s onslaught. Continue to pretend that you don’t know what I’m after.”

  Fate pushed against the dirt, her back tensing against his foot. “You’re mad,” she spat. She reached for her cane, and Lu kicked it out of her grasp.

  “No, Clarissa. I’ve just seen the kingdom crumble. The queen is in the dirt, and I am here to take the crown.”

  Lu removed his foot and knelt beside her, offering a hand.

  “Or maybe all that’s a lie. Perhaps, tonight, you’ve simply wearied me. You decide.”

  Fate glared at his outstretched hand. She spat at his feet and scrambled for her cane. “You will not get away with this.”

  “I already have. Time and again, I already have.”

  Reaching her cane, she eased herself onto her feet, her glare never leaving him. He made no move to stop her, or to follow as she retreated back from him. He needed her distracted, angry, and confused. Not dead.

  “You have sided with Just?” she hissed.

  “I have sided with that which is required. Your relevance slips, day by day, the longer you deny what your master desires, your relevance slips.”

  “I am the god of this world!

  “The world changes.”

  “I am the one to whom it was entrusted!”

  “Trust fails.”

  “Godsdamnit, what are you planning?” Her words were a shriek.

  Lu shrugged, then shook his head and turned. As he walked away, he schooled his footsteps to a steady pace.

  “Dydal, what are you planning?”

  “I am not Dydal,” he called back to her. “My name is Lu.”

  She did not follow. Hopefully he’d put enough fear in her to keep her distant for a few days yet.

  “Dydal!”

  With Teachings of a Whore tucked beneath one arm, he ignored the shriek, smiled, and continued walking.

  CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX

  Sybil had decided to come here alone, as she always had done, and Kindrel had been nice enough to watch over Tin and Iri. The pillars were gone, the gold gilding gone, all of it gone except for the marble floor and the heart stone.

  It was a surprise that she would feel this way about the temple she had hated. Now that her mother’s temple was gone, her previous complaints as to its construction and the destruction of their old home seemed trivial. She no longer cared that a house she had lived in millennia ago no longer stood, she was only worried for her family.

  Her search of the city had proved fruitless. There were no other gods or godkind in Trel, it was only her, her daughters, and those aboard Kindrel’s vessel. The man who might or might not have been Dydal had not yet returned and she was beginning to suspect that he never would.

  In all, it was a rather isolating experience. Though alone for almost five hundred years, she’d always had the belief that her family was whole and happy, that they were still here in the nation of Trel and beyond, thriving as they always had, and leading the mortals they served into a brighter future. She felt lonelier now than she had during her worst years on that world. Her girls would not know the Trel she had loved or the family that had built it.

  In retrospect, she should have predicted the events that Kindrel had described. She herself had felt the Call’s power, she knew how deranged it could make a person, but to think that Galina and Just had been driven mad by it, was too shocking a revelation. She would not believe it until she saw proof.

  Sybil knew that, eventually, she would have to leave. Eventually, she would have to strike for this Kin’Ken or Lendal to look for Nikom and Tyrena, but for now, she couldn’t go. If Just was truly mad she had to find a way to cure him. Galina, too. The Blood Call was a powerful force, but if Sybil could overcome it, then so could they. She had solved harder puzzles in years past, the root of this disease and its cure should be a simple one.

  It finally made sense that Mother had not come for her. If Sybil had to isolate Galina and Just for five hundred years in order to break the Call’s hold, then she would. Mother had saved her from the same fate
, and she was willing to do the same for her siblings, but it begged a terrifying question. If Mother had known of the Call, if she had known that isolation was a cure, then why had Sybil been singled out? Why had Mother saved her, but not the others?

  And where is Mother now?

  Here he was. Back in Trel, that pathetic squalor the local savages called a city. Loy had been humbled here, in the ancient land of Trel. He had learned many things, but one truth remained to him – two truths really: that Trel was a shithole, almost worse than the rot, and that the people of this land were largely moronic.

  Skibs was the proof of it. Every word from his mouth was some crude joke or innuendo. It was a shock to learn the man was not simply a believer in Loy’s father as Loy had assumed, but was in fact, a priest sworn to Nikom. If only the two could meet, at least one of them would have a rude awakening.

  Loy had to admit, however, not all the mortals here were annoying. Though poorly managed by their local gods – their absentee gods – some of them, like Rise, were actually capable and intelligent. Even without the oversight of a god, Rise’s skill with the flute approached miraculous. Usually such wondrous talent came only with the formal tutelage of a god, and yet she played so beautifully the sound almost made the sight of Trel bearable. When he inevitably completed Fate’s task, he would be sad to leave her, though perhaps he would not have to. Once he had the power of a god, he would need several musicians to fill out his new court here in ancient Trel, and her fool husband was so much the dumb yet loyal puppy that Loy could probably convince them both to stay in his service.

  Loy looked out onto the city. A kind of nervous anticipation hummed through his flesh. He had thought he was returning to Trel a coward and a quitter, but the moment they had come within range of the city, he had felt the aura. Somewhere beneath that horizon, was an aura like none other he had felt.